How Women Use Social Media [Infographic]

Social media sites are having a powerful effect on our lives. It’s important for marketers to understand how people use social networks, and Ethan Bloch of Flowtown has created a great infographic that shows how women leverage the social Web, which sites they use, and how much/why they participate.

Women are online and interacting on social sites just as much — if not, more — than their male counterparts. More than half of all American women participate in social media at least once a week, and younger women use it the most.

Takeaways:

53% of adult females use social media at least on a weekly basis.

Their top interests are entertainment, food, health/wellness, and recipes/cooking. Fashion/beauty/shopping comes in fifth.

34% of women use social networks to get information, while 20% of women are looking for advice and recommendations.

42 million people is a significant demographic. If you are involved in any of: entertainment, food, health/wellness, and recipes/cooking. Fashion/beauty/shopping, and you do not have a social media presence, you need to get one.

Failing to put your company in front of that massive market would be a huge waste of an opportunity

Women have become an increasingly powerful force in online social networking and ecommerce and it'll be interesting to see how this trend affects influences media communication and even business trends in the near future. I'm also curious about what factors help or harm the harnessing of male attention online.

Corey J. Tronchin

The Women demographic for social media is one of the biggest vital behaviors that need to be defined in any social media initiative.Women have been able to spread word of mouth influence better then men will ever. We should all know this who are able to connect well with women. Too bad most men are lost when it come to learning how women are. There is a god :)

I realize I am a little late responding to this post, however would love to have people revisit since it’s still a very important factor to consider. I agree with an earlier comment, that this statistic just validates how vital it is for companies to be social online, especially those marketing to women. It just seems like there are so many networks (online communities, blogs, microblogs, forums) and tools out there, that it can be extremely overwhelming for the end user (and to the PR/mktg person for a small company for that matter) to decipher which ones are the most crucial to be a part of and monitor on a regular basis, etc. I think most people and companies are still figuring out how to use social media most efficiently and to their best advantage, and we’re riding the wave. It will be interesting to see where we end up, and which social media networks and sources will sustain. Don’t you agree? Does anyone have any tips on how to best manage and/or monitor social networks when you are also trying to maintain other pieces of your business? And for the everyday woman consumer…her life? With the magnitude of sites, sources, blogs, active Twitter participants and influencers, a person could easily be on these social network sites 24/7.